Flowers
by sunnie.side.down
Summary: Sasuke sees flowers. Russian translation available.


**A/N:** Russian translation by Селина Дарк available on ficbook (/ readfic/8700852)

* * *

"He says he's been seeing flowers, Dr. Nara. I thought it might just be a phase, but… It's really worrying me," Mikoto's voice echoed through the door. They were talking about Sasuke as he sat outside the office. His feet _thunked_ as he bounced his short legs on the front of the overstuffed chair. He plucked a daisy growing from the armrest and twirled it in between his fingers, mesmerized by the blur the petals became.

"How old is your son Sasuke?" came Dr. Nara's calm and patient voice. Some papers rustled.

"He's turning five in a month."

"And how long has he been seeing flowers?"

"I'm not sure how long. I've been aware of it ever since he began to talk."

"Okay bring him in."

Sasuke dropped the flower and slid off the chair to stand on the floor.

* * *

It was already an hour past the time Sasuke's father was supposed to pick him up from school. His mother was usually the one to do it but on Sasuke's way out in the morning that day his father stopped him and said that he will do it. It was all Sasuke could think about for the rest of the day, he was so excited. But now all the other kids were gone, well almost all of them. It was just Sasuke, some blond kid, and the teacher, Iruka.

"Is your mother coming to pick you up today Sasuke?" Iruka asked. Sasuke could tell that he wanted to get home. Sasuke looked at Iruka and then eyed the blond kid sitting a few feet away. He didn't look like he was really waiting for someone to come. It like he was killing time.

Sasuke shook his head, "My father's coming today. He should be here any minute."

Iruka nodded and continued to wait with his two remaining students. Sasuke stood in stony silence. With every minute that went by, another flower bloomed. Twenty minutes later when a family friend came in place of his father, the courtyard was a meadow.

* * *

An instrumental version of "Amazing Grace" played as the attendants came up one by one to bid Sasuke's brother Itachi one last goodbye. Mikoto and Fugaku stood by the casket and Sasuke was right next to them. Mikoto's tears flowed endlessly. A whole tissue box would not enough for her. Sasuke's face mirrored his father's, blank and emotionless to the casual observer.

For Fugaku, his face was due to practiced Uchiha control, his sorrow saved for a more private occasion. But for Sasuke instead of tears, flowers appeared on the ground, in the pews, on the suits and dresses of the attendees. They wouldn't stop. There were more flowers in his sight than flowers by the casket. But Sasuke was okay with that because these flowers too were for his brother.

* * *

"How many flowers do you see right now Sasuke?" Dr. Nara asked. It was always the first thing he said to Sasuke when he came in.

Sasuke scanned the room counting in ten's. "About two hundred, give or take."

Dr. Nara scribbled something down on his notepad. "More than last time then."

"I suppose so."

"Why do you think that is?" he asked.

Sasuke narrowed his eyes. He knew Dr. Nara knew. "What do you think?" he bit out.

"Now now," Dr. Nara waved a hand in surrender. "Do you wish to talk about it?"

Sasuke's face immediately closed up. Any and all emotions were gathered and stuffed in a small corner of his consciousness. A flower appeared on Dr. Nara's dress shirt. Then another and another until his shirt was a mess of weaved stems with daisies and daffodils and roses poking out everywhere. The emotions on his face were gone but they over spilled into his sight. "No," he replied. "I do not wish to talk about this right now."

Dr. Nara didn't push and made a note on his notepad.

* * *

"Hiya! I'm Naruto," the blond kid from Sasuke's class held a hand out to Sasuke. Sasuke didn't acknowledge him and kept reading his book absentmindedly spinning a flower between his fingers. "Hel-loooo. Anyone home?"

When Naruto's hand waved too close in front of his face, Sasuke snapped his dark eyes to the blue ones of Naruto's. "What do you want?"

"Whoa!" Naruto backed off a little at Sasuke's harsh tone. "No need to bite my head off. I just wanted to say 'hi' since I don't think we've ever talked."

"There's probably a reason for that, don't cha think? Just leave me alone." And that was exactly what Naruto didn't do.

Naruto pestered Sasuke everyday; greeting him, asking him dumb questions, finding him at lunch no matter how many times Sasuke changed his eating location. Sasuke thought it was annoying, but it was even more annoying trying to deflect Naruto's advances. Soon Sasuke found himself nodding his head at Naruto in the morning, answering his questions more often than not, and waiting for Naruto to grab his lunch before heading to that day's eating spot. It was much easier than actively ignoring Naruto. Sometimes Sasuke would even catch himself smiling at something Naruto rambled on about.

One morning when Sasuke was pretending to read from a book as Naruto chatted away Sasuke realized that something was different with the world. He looked up from the book he wasn't reading. The sky was empty of all clouds, signifying a hot day and the fast approach of summer. The shade was different though, brighter, more vivid. It was the same with the grass and trees, like before that very moment Sasuke only saw in shades of dreary grey. The wind ignited a symphony of rustling leaves. A mass of birds flew from the nearby forest, disturbed by the rustling. They added to the music with every flap of their wings, every beat of their tiny hearts. Was the world always like this, Sasuke wondered. Was it always so peaceful?

Sasuke's eyes were drawn to Naruto as he laughed at some story he was telling. Naruto's laugh echoed through Sasuke's ears, bounced off the walls of the school building, and was then whisked away to the farthest reaches of the earth by the wind.

Sasuke supposed the world has changed because he and Naruto were friends.

* * *

"How many flowers do you see right now Sasuke?" Dr. Nara asked.

Sasuke scanned the brown, matted carpet looking for flowers, he looked at the ugly patterned couch off to the side of the room, he looked at the Dr. Nara's desk, the two lounge chairs by the couch, the bookshelf full of various medical books, the lamp in the corner of the room that flickered occasionally, the open window with the billowing blue curtains that overlooked the buys street outside. He just looked and took in every detail. Sasuke was surprised. He was so used to blocking the flowers from his vision that he never noticed when they dwindled down to almost nothing.

With a voice full of wonder, Sasuke answers, "Seven. I see seven."

Dr. Nara raised an eyebrow, "Only seven?"

"Yeah."

"Hmm…Are you happy?"

Sasuke took a deep breath and let a small smile appear on his face, "I think I might be."

* * *

"Sasuke?" Naruto asked and fidgeted with his hands. He was nervous. It made Sasuke uneasy. A flower popped up by Sasuke's foot.

"Hn?"

"I…" Naruto paused, swallowed and continued, "I'm moving to Suna."

Sasuke's world stopped. The force of the rotation of the earth slammed in to Sasuke like hitting a wall at one thousand miles per hour. "When?" he breathed.

When he felt like he got his bearings, unpeeled himself from the wall, dusted himself off, the world accelerated again as Naruto replied and turned him upside down. "Tomorrow."

Hurt filled Sasuke's eyes and flowers filled his vision.

* * *

"How many flowers do you see right now Sasuke?"

Sasuke slowly scanned the room with unseeing eyes, not really counting. "Too many."

"More then."

"Yeah."

"Why do you think that is?" he asked.

"I don't know."

"I think you do know. Tell me."

Sasuke sighed. He didn't want to bother with avoiding questions today. Sasuke would get out faster if he complied. "My best friend moved away."

"Did this hurt you?"

"Yeah, it did. A lot. He didn't tell me until it was too late!" Sasuke snapped.

"Calm down. No need to get belligerent."

Sasuke took a deep breath. Sasuke was angry but the flowers sprouting on every available surface said otherwise. Every flower that Naruto eased out of existence in the time that Sasuke knew him came back tenfold. Sasuke couldn't see; his sight only flowers. He couldn't breath. The flowers ran out of space around him and began to grow inside him. Filling his stomach, infesting his lungs, clogging his veins, closing off his windpipe, overflowing from his mouth, stopping his heart for brief moment.

Sasuke gagged and tore his way through the overgrown garden in Dr. Nara's office to the trashcan to empty his stomach, to rid his body of the flowers, of the gut-wrenching sorrow.

"They're gone. Itachi…." The petals were making it hard to talk. "Naruto…"

Dr. Nara was by his side rubbing his back. "You can still talk with Naruto. He just moved away."

"I can't."

"Why not?"

"Because I left before I could get his contact information." Petals squeezed out of Sasuke's tear ducts and slid down his cheeks.

"Sasuke. I want you to breathe with me." Dr. Nara took an exaggerated breath.

 _Inhale_.

"I'm all alone now."

 _Exhale_.

"No you're not. Naruto just moved away. You can ask the school for his number."

 _Inhale_.

"But Itachi…"

 _Exhale_.

"He was sick Sasuke. You know that. People cannot live forever."

 _Inhale_.

"But…"

 _Exhale_.

"Sasuke. Breathe."

 _Inhale_.

The flowers began to decay, to melt away into each other, blending into a mess of green life and black death, until the entire mess evaporated into the air leaving behind a small garden of flowers and the clean smell of Dr. Nara's office.

 _Exhale_.

* * *

"Tell me Sasuke," Dr. Nara leaned forward in his plush office chair, "Do you still see the flowers?"

If he asked Sasuke what color the carpet was at that moment, Sasuke wouldn't be able to answer truthfully. He would have to answer from memory. Same with if he asked him to tell him what color his desk or his bookshelf or even his chair. Everything was covered. Sasuke was tired. He was tired of seeing the flowers, tired of seeing Dr. Nara, tired of being so sad all the time. He knew that the flowers would never go away. They were a part of him like how his hair, his eyes, his skin were. What was the point of these visits? There was nothing he could do about the flowers. He would just have to deal with it. This room, these visits, they were just reminders of the bad things. Sasuke wanted to be free.

Sasuke looked straight into Dr. Nara's eyes, "No, I do not see them anymore."

* * *

 **A/N** : Talk about mood whiplash. Two points if you can guess where the whole 'seeing flowers' thing came from.

Thank you for reading.

Originally posted on AO3.


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